The Guardian Knight of Affection-Starved Young Ladies

93 – Blood-Connected Family (05)

094.

“Then…”

After some silence.

Laris slowly opened his mouth.

“Kallen, you mean you can defeat all those people…”

It’s hard to believe even as he says it.

Kallen’s attitude now was so confident.

Even to the point where it seemed like an unfounded belief, Laris couldn’t help but deny his own words even more.

The fact that the current generation is abnormal is already spreading little by little in social circles.

The youngest daughter of Lakatus has begun to establish an overwhelming position by bringing her thoughts.

It is said that the civil war of the Hyatt family succeeded, and the eldest daughter pushed out the eldest son.

And the highlight was the banquet hosted by the Dranus family held a while ago.

At that place, the young girl who would bear the name of Dranus proved herself to be an excellent head of the family.

Laris leaving the salon he originally belonged to and heading to Ecclesia is in that context.

Indeed, the young ladies of this generation have something extraordinary about them.

However.

No matter how much that is the case.

There is a limit to talent.

Even a ‘genius’ can be defined by someone, and the time that has passed cannot fill that gap.

Kallen’s attitude is exactly that.

The confidence and conviction engraved in his clear, dark eyes seemed to know no defeat.

Such a confident attitude, as if it were certain that he would defeat the private army of the Lyle merchant group and the head of the Flache family.

A boy who has not yet undergone the coming-of-age ceremony, defeating those who have experienced countless battlefields.

No matter how peaceful the generation, it is not as if there were no battles at all during the years they lived.

And that difference is quite clear.

“No… surely there is another good way…”

“What.”

Laris awkwardly tried to distort Kallen’s words with a forced smile.

But Kallen shakes his head and corrects the distortion.

“It is only a possibility. We will avoid antagonizing them as much as possible, and only when they betray us. Only when they try to threaten our lives.”

He is speaking as indirectly as possible, but Laris is not that stupid.

No, rather, he is wise and intelligent enough to endure in the family despite the endless threats from the Lyle merchant group.

So he could understand.

Kallen’s words awkwardly recite his own limitations, but within them lies a hope not much different from what is in his eyes.

Why?

A boy whose appearance seems far from the battlefield.

To Laris, who knew well the strength of the soldiers of the Lyle Merchant Guild and his father, it was an incredibly reckless sight.

As Laris stared blankly at Kalen, Kalen slowly stood up.

“Shall we make it certain?”

“…Pardon?”

“Lady Flache.”

However.

It was Laris who was more desperate.

Wasn’t it an ‘old wish’?

After sending off his mother, his father changed.

His sister left, and he spent lonely nights caressing the necklace.

So he doesn’t even realize it himself.

Even though he read hope in his eyes, he endlessly denies and questions his own heart.

It was a kind of plea.

A belief that he could reach a place that was impossible by any means.

A plea to the boy who cast the faint light of that belief, asking if it was really true.

“Appoint me as your escort knight. The term is until you finish your mother’s funeral and safely complete your affairs with the family.”

“…”

So even if that belief and hope are groundless.

He can’t help but rely on it.

It’s okay not to go too far.

Even during the last outing, it was Laris himself who clung to that tiny possibility and spoke.

“…The reward…”

Laris murmured with his head slightly lowered.

“What about the reward…”

But the room was small.

Since it was just the two of them talking, it was quiet, so Kalen heard Laris’s words clearly.

“…Let’s think about it after it’s over.”

Kalen had never thought much about the reward either.

Even when he helped Eliana, Selacia, and Sinat, he didn’t receive anything that could be called a reward.

In the end, if Blamia hadn’t taken him in, he would have been a cold corpse lying on the street by now, so he had no greed.

After this matter is settled, I plan to leave for the Spirit Realm, so should I ask for preparations for that?

Kallen answered as such.

For some reason, Laris remained silent for a long time, then accepted the proposal with a somewhat grateful expression.

“Then what do you plan to do now?”

Having set the goal, it was now time to act.

It meant holding his mother’s funeral, but he had asked for help to bury her.

Kallen asked if he had a place in mind.

“…There is a place my mother mentioned when she was alive. I didn’t know why she said it back then… but perhaps she knew her situation.”

Laris gradually calmed down, returning to the inscrutable expression he had when they first met at the banquet hall.

But that didn’t mean he was cold.

Had he found some comfort in the formal act of appointing him as a guard knight?

There was a slight sense of ease in the way he looked at Kallen.

“There is a famous place in the south, have you heard of Latia Falls?”

Latia Falls was a name he had heard before.

To compare, it was similar to the Winter Island he had seen with Eliana.

Somewhat dangerous, but a breathtaking view worth visiting at least once before dying.

Such places were very famous in social circles.

And when Kallen heard about the falls…

“Why do you ask?”

“It’s nothing. It just seems like the conditions are being met one by one.”

“…Anyway, there is a love story tied to Latia Falls. It’s a bit of a sad story, but my mother said that if she were to die, she would like to be buried there.”

Was there such a story tied to Latia Falls?

Kallen, not knowing the details, quietly listened to Laris’s words.

“It’s just a story that might come out of a third-rate play, so it’s okay if you don’t know the details. I want to bury my mother there.”

“Understood.”

At the mention of a third-rate play,

Kallen’s eyes briefly turned to a small bookshelf.

But it was really just for a moment, and he looked back at Laris and asked.

“Is it okay not to inform the family?”

“…”

If things had been different.

If Laris had not been abandoned by her father, it would have been right to inform him.

Because excluding her father’s opinion in the matter of burying her mother is unthinkable.

Laris, who had lived under the watchful eyes of the Lyle merchant group and her father, would have naturally answered that it was the right thing to do.

But Laris couldn’t come up with an answer.

Was it because Kallen listened to her well?

Was it because she was blinded by the sliver of hope he showed?

For the first time, Laris felt a sense of injustice.

She was abandoned by her father as his daughter.

The family was taken over by her stepmother and her family, and she had to part with her sister.

She couldn’t even stand up for herself, and now she could finally take out her mother’s keepsakes from the locked drawer.

If she reported this to her father, Laris herself would undoubtedly face many restrictions.

Was it her last remaining conscience, her father…

No, the head of the Flache family always received reports on Laris’s whereabouts.

At least he would know she was safe, a selfish thought.

So, even if she didn’t report it, the confidant planted by the head would soon report it.

At that point, she felt a bit of rebellion.

“No.”

Laris’s voice trembled slightly with anxiety.

But she spoke in a more resolute tone.

“I will go without informing him.”

Laris naturally realized.

It felt clumsy, but this was a change.

She had named it ‘a long-cherished wish,’ but it was merely a dream she dared to dream.

A change that came to her, who had been unable to achieve anything, using the reality that any method was impossible as a shield.

So, she realized she had to change herself as well.

Even if it meant completely severing ties with the family.

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Even if it meant completely letting go of the faint warmth of her father that still lingered.

She decided to let it all go.

Laris made up her mind and smiled faintly.

“…It might be a bit forced, but then, Sir Knight.”

For some reason, those murky gray eyes seemed a little brighter.

They looked more like a complete gray.

“Will you stay with me?”

Kallen, who had been quietly watching, nodded.

Laris smiled, her eyes brightening.

*

Clatter-

If there is an end to luxury, could it be here?

A room so splendid that such a sentiment naturally arose.

An old man sat in a chair that seemed fit for an emperor, holding a glass.

“…Even though you returned, you didn’t tell my father.”

“Yes, Master of the Merchant Guild.”

“And there was a boy with you, someone we don’t know.”

“Yes.”

The glass held a liquor with a vintage aroma.

The old man tilted his head as if he couldn’t understand.

“Hmm… I thought you had given up…”

“You don’t need to worry.”

“Hmm?”

“Even if she brought such a brat, there is nothing the young lady can do.”

“That’s right. Of course, it should be that way. That’s the price for feeding and housing you.”

“…Yes.”

Uncertainty breeds fear.

But the old man neither understood nor showed any sign of fear.

As if he had experienced such things countless times.

He only cast his gaze at the man who had surrendered before him.

“Just leave it for now, and keep an eye on her actions. She might just be trying to marry a man like her sister did.”

“Yes, Master of the Merchant Guild.”

The man vanished suddenly after finishing his words.

The old man chuckled and drank all the liquor in his glass.

“Interesting… So interesting…”

The sky had already embraced the pitch-black darkness.